Not to get all political and what not... the problem has more to do with politicians only believing what they are told, and only talking to people with money.
the long term effects of ethonal are currently unknown, however we know that its based largely on corn, corn is a terrible producer of ethanol, in fact not much is a good producer of ethonal, its a very energy demanding process, lots of heat. The really funny thing about E is all the bunny huggers are loving it because its a "green energy" they do not take into account that the power stations that run the E processors are powered largely by coal...
To get 1/5 of whiskey at 80 proof ish it takes about a gallon of mash, to get 1/5 of 200 proof you need approximately 3 gallons of mash, now imagine how much corn (figure 1/4-1/2 of the mash is corn) and water its going to take to process 1,000,000 gallons of E everyday? Not to mention it takes a day or two just to distill the alcohol out of the water. All while holding the mash at something like 185 degrees farenheit. Mean while out in the midwest corn farmers (cough CON AGRA, corporations...) are griping about not having enough money and being a poor poor farmer, and we just need to have a little more land... and two brand new 200 hp tractors that are radio controlled, and enough seed to plant 4000 acres+. Anybody else see where this is going. When in history has the lowley "farmer" ever had this much political clout... Ethanol has to be one of the worst things to happen in this country... its just not apparent yet...
I'm done now, for the record actual farmers I'm all sorts of ok with, its the corporations masquerading as poor farmers that bothers me.
Just cause I'm from darlictown doesn't mean I've actually used a still... recently... or ever...
